


we haven't yet (but my head's spinning)

by daisysusan



Category: Football RPF
Genre: Aggressively Handwaved, Alternate Universe - College/University, Fluff, Kid Fic, M/M, Single Parents, Teacher-Student Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-12
Updated: 2015-09-12
Packaged: 2018-04-20 07:47:59
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4779452
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/daisysusan/pseuds/daisysusan
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In which Sergio is finishing college while being a single dad and his cute professor is also a single dad and they keep running into each other. And more.</p>
            </blockquote>





	we haven't yet (but my head's spinning)

WEEK 1

Professor Casillas bites his lip when he talks. Not all the time, but enough that Sergio notices it when he glances up from his notebook to make sure he’s writing the dates down correctly. It’s easy to see from the third row—not so close he feels like he’s being scrutinized, but hopefully close enough to make him a slightly more devoted student this time around. In theory.

His handwriting is still horrible, he thinks as he looks back down at his notes, and at least three of the dates he’s written down are probably wrong. So he’ll actually have to go to office hours and make sure he’s studying the right things. Making all the scheduling work for that will be a real pain in the ass.

 

WEEK 2

It’s not until Professor Casillas calls for their introductory essays that Sergio notices the smear of—well, it’s probably pureed peas, from the color, but it doesn’t really matter what it is because it’s brown and all too visible across the margin of the first page of his essay. He doesn’t even have time to scribble a cursory _sorry, kids are messy eaters_ in the margin. 

If he’s generous about how old he looks, he probably looks five years older than everyone else in the classroom. 

Professor Casillas will probably assume that _he’s_ a messy eater. Well, it’s kind of true. 

 

WEEK 4

Sergio finally makes it to office hours two weeks before the midterm exam. Scheduling the babysitter to stay an extra two hours was tricky; she has her own classes to juggle. 

“Hi,” Sergio says, knocking lightly on the open door. 

“Oh, hi,” Professor Casillas says brightly when he looks up. “Sergio Ramos, right?”

Out of nowhere, Sergio feels hesitant. “Yeah, hi, that’s me.” 

“Sit down,” Professor Casillas says. “How are you?”

The chair in front of the desk squeaks a little when Sergio sits down but it’s comfortable and worn. “I’m good,” he says. He’s nervous. Why is he nervous? “And you?”

“I’m doing great.” There’s a brief silence while Professor Casillas roots around in his desk. “I assume you want to talk about your essay,” he says, not looking up. 

“Uh, yes,” Sergio says. 

There’s a rustling of papers and then “Here it is—oh shit, did I spill something on it while I was grading?”

Sergio forces himself to look meet Professor Casillas’s eyes. “No,” he says. “I spilled my son’s baby food on it and didn’t notice until it was too late.” 

“Oh,” Professor Casillas says, and his smile is different than all the others Sergio’s seen on him in class. It’s more in his eyes than in his mouth. He realizes belatedly that Professor Casillas swore unrepentantly at him and can’t hold back his grin. 

“You have a son?” Professor Casillas continues, and Sergio nods, smiling even more widely. “How old is he?”

“Eleven months,” Sergio says. “His name is Tomás.” He can hear the pride radiating in his own voice. 

“That’s almost the same age as my Maria,” Professor Casillas says and before Sergio is entirely aware it’s happening, he’s looking at a phone showing a picture of a little girl with huge blue eyes. She does, in fact, look about Tomás’s age. 

Sergio smiles. “She’s beautiful.” 

Something changes in Professor Casillas’s face and he sets the phone down quickly. “But you came to talk about your essay, not my daughter,” he says, his tone more measured—more like it is during lectures.

For lack of anything better to say, Sergio nods. Frankly, he’d rather hear about baby Maria than how to expand his introductory essay using the concepts they’ve covered in the first four weeks of lectures, but that’s not how you’re supposed to go about getting an education. Professor Casillas doesn’t ask him about Tomás or volunteer any more pictures of Maria, and Sergio spends most of his 30-minute visit taking careful notes and asking questions he hopes sound intelligent.

 

WEEK 5

Tomás gets sick, bad enough that he has a fever and keeps Sergio up half the night worrying, and he misses the week’s first lecture because of it. Professor Casillas sends him an email that afternoon, perfunctory but surprisingly thoughtful, asking him if everything is okay and if he needs anything. Taken aback, Sergio replies more honestly than he intends: he needs a full night’s sleep and the slides from the lecture, but that he’ll be back on Thursday. As soon as the message is sent, he wishes for an undo button. 

Professor Casillas replies promptly, saying he can’t do anything about the sleep but with the slides attached. _-Iker_ , it ends, shockingly informal from a man Sergio’s never seen without a sport coat.

\--

On Thursday, Sergio slides into his usual seat as the minute hand hits 12. Technically on time. 

It takes him a moment to notice the paper cup of coffee sitting on the corner of the desk, hot to the touch. He opens it suspiciously and then notices the words scrawled on the side in a familiar chicken-scratch: _almost as good as sleep? -I_

 

WEEK 6

Sergio is the last person to finish his midterm, which isn’t much of a surprise. He’s always taken tests slowly, except when he would rush through them and then get terrible results and that’s just—not an acceptable result this time. So instead, he’s the last person to finish, not putting his pencil down until Professor Casillas calls time. 

He must look nervous, because he gets a reassuring smile when he hands the paper in. “I’m sure you did well,” Professor Casillas says. Sergio smiles back despite himself.

\--

Two nights later, midterms completed more or less successfully—at the very least, nothing that felt like a catastrophic failure—Sergio leaves Tomás with his mother and takes himself to the bar down the street for a few hours. There’s nothing he particularly wants to watch, and no one he particularly wants to go with, but just being around people who aren’t his classmates and aren’t babies will be more than enough of a reward. 

He drinks a beer and a half faster than he should and then forces himself to slow down, and manages a complete argument about who’s going to win the league this year before he finishes the second beer. It’s not until he turns back toward the TV that he notices Professor Casillas sitting three seats down and smiling into his own beer. 

“Hi, Professor,” Sergio says. 

“Hi,” Professor Casillas says, and then, “Call me Iker.” 

Sergio feels like the beers hit him all at once and suddenly he’s warm all over. “Okay, Iker,” he says, and the name is round and comfortable in his mouth. “What brings you here?”

“Have you ever graded undergraduate midterms?” Sergio shakes his head, and Pro—and Iker continues. “It drives me to drink.” 

“Better or worse than the questions people ask in lecture?”

Iker grimaces. “Worse.” But then he smiles again. “What about you, what are you doing here?”

“Finally done with midterms,” Sergio says. “And I needed some company that speaks in sentences instead of babytalk.” 

“Maria is wonderful but she’s not great for conversation,” Iker says. “Nor are most of my students.” 

Sergio’s pretty sure he’s been insulted twice tonight. He kind of doesn’t care. 

“You’re already better than most of them,” Iker continues, and then Sergio has to hide a smile in his glass. Against his better judgment, he glances at Iker’s hands. No ring. But then, that doesn’t necessarily mean anything. 

“Thanks, I think,” Sergio says. Iker’s grin is genuine, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “It’s nice to know Tomás hasn’t ruined my skills, since it’s just the two of us most of the time.” It’s a stupid thing to say, a hint he shouldn’t be dropping to his professor, even if said professor is smiling invitingly at him. 

Sergio feels like he should leave—he said he was going to make better choices this time around, and leaving is probably the best choice right now. But Iker has his phone out and he’s flipping through an endless roll of pictures of a smiling baby girl who must be Maria. Sergio coos at all the right times; it’s easy, with how cute Maria is. There’s no mother in the pictures. Sergio chides himself a little for noticing. At least he’s not drunk enough to ask.

Instead, he gets out his own phone and lets Iker flip through the countless pictures of Tomás. It gets easy from there—a picture of Tomás and Sergio’s grandmother sets Iker off talking about his own grandmother and the town he loves so much. By the time Iker’s stopped talking, Sergio’s had enough to drink that being asked where he’s from sends him into a rambling story about his childhood and destroying his knee when he was sixteen and what a mess he made of university the first time around. Iker smiles and hums and makes encouraging noises. It’s a long time before Sergio notices the time, and when he does it’s later than he expected.

“I should get home,” he says, and it’s the most grown up he’s ever felt, aside from the first time he held Tomás. 

“Oh, fuck.” The expletive falls as easily from Iker’s lips this time as it did the first time Sergio heard him swear. It’s charmingly incongruous with his neat button-downs and grandfatherly sweaters. He might iron his jeans. “I should too.” 

If Iker wasn’t his professor—if this was just a few years ago—if Sergio wasn’t trying to have his life together—if a lot of things, he might do something blatant and stupid, like resting his hand too high on Iker’s thigh, or maybe just backing him against the wall outside and kissing him senseless. But he doesn’t; he says good night and pays his tab and goes home alone. There should prizes for shit like this. Better prizes than an empty bed and a grudging sense of having done the right thing. 

 

WEEK 7

It’s clearly one of Iker’s favorite topics; Sergio can tell by how animated his face is as he gives the lecture and he finds himself biting back a smile from his seat in the third row. Iker’s eyes are bright, and Sergio is close enough to see it, and it’s so easy to think about Iker looking at him like that. About Iker looking like that because of him. 

_Shit_. 

He realizes, belatedly, that he’s missed at least a whole thought—there’s a few keywords scrawled on the blackboard he doesn’t recognize. He’ll have to go to office hours and ask for clarification. How terrible. Being aware he has a crush on his professor doesn’t actually make it easier to not get distracted by rapidly moving hands, and the sincerity of his smile, and the way he bites back a laugh when one of the smartasses in the back row asks a predictably smart-ass question. 

Maybe he should read over the section in the textbook before he goes to talk to Iker, just so he doesn’t sound like he wasn’t paying attention at all. 

Or—he could get a lot of help from Iker.

That sounds nice too.

\--

The night before he’s planning to go to Iker’s office hours, Sergio goes grocery shopping because he’s more or less a responsible adult now. He has Tomás balanced on his hip, because he’s in a mood and started wailing when Sergio put him in the little chair. He’s hyper-tired, probably, from the endless squirming and displeased noises.

“Shhh, we’ll be home soon,” Sergio coos at him quietly. 

“Ba,” Tomás says, swatting at Sergio’s hair and then trying to stick his fist in Sergio’s mouth. Sergio removes it and it looks for a minute like Tomás is on the verge of a tantrum when something behind Sergio distracts him. 

“Hello,” a familiar voice says. And there’s Iker, with his own pile of groceries, and a girl sitting in the trolley, craning her neck to look at Tomás. 

“Well,” Sergio says. “This must be Maria.” At the sound of her name, Maria cracks a huge smile and starts babbling. 

“And I assume this is Tomás.” Tomás decides now is a good time to make Sergio look like a terrible parent by scowling, punching him in the arm, and screwing up his face like he’s about to cry. 

“It is,” Sergio says and then, apologetic. “He’s pretty tired.” As if on cue, Tomás starts rubbing his eyes. He mumbles something in Sergio’s ear. “I would have left him at home but there’s no one to leave him with,” Sergio continues, guiltily. 

Iker nods, looking sympathetic. “I’ll let you finish, then. So you can go put him to bed.” There’s a twist to the corners of his mouth. Maybe he’s reluctant. Or maybe he thinks it’s awkward to run into Sergio again. Either way, Sergio doesn’t linger; he can only hold off Tomás’s inevitable tantrum for so long, and it’s best that doesn’t happen in front of Iker. Even if Iker didn’t dream about rewarding Sergio for doing well on his essays by kissing him in his office the way Sergio did, he’d like to keep Iker liking him. 

\--

Office hours are before class, and Sergio knocks on Iker’s half-open door at quarter past the hour. Plenty of time for them to finish and for other students to come in if they have questions. 

Iker mumbles “come in,” and then, when he looks up, breaks into a smile. It would be lying if Sergio said his heart didn’t get all fucking cliché on him and skip a beat. 

“Hi,” Sergio says, trying to keep his smile to normal levels. Most students probably aren’t thrilled to come to office hours. Or, well, Iker’s very cute. Maybe he’s used to students having crushes on him. 

“What’s up?”

“Well,” Sergio starts, trailing off. “I kind of missed some of what you said in our last lecture.” 

“Anything in particular?” Iker is still smiling at him. Somehow, Sergio had expected him to be type to get disappointed with students for not paying attention, but he doesn’t look it at all. 

“Yeah, the dates you wrote on the board? I got the dates themselves but missed why they matter.” 

Iker shoots him a knowing look. It very clearly says “I know you weren’t paying attention and I’m going to humor you.” Sergio tries not to blush. 

When Iker starts talking, explaining what he hadn’t gotten written down in lecture, Sergio realizes the flaw in his plan: Iker is still so animated and excited talking about this that he can’t focus on anything but his hands and his mouth and his eyes. He might need to start recording the lectures instead of trying to take notes. By forcing himself to look away, Sergio manages to scrawl down enough of what Iker’s saying that he probably won’t fail the final, but it’s tough going. 

He even asks a clarification question and then mentally pats himself on the back so much he misses half the answer. Oh well. 

“Anything else?” Iker asks, and Sergio shakes his head. He starts to open his mouth, he ought to thank Iker for his time at least, but then Iker keeps talking. “How’s Tomás?” 

“He’s good,” Sergio says with a smile that’s only a little forced. It would be rude not to answer, after all. “He’s been fussy for a few nights but he slept like a rock last night.” 

“Is he walking yet?” Something about Iker’s tone is ominous. Sergio laughs.

“No, thank god. What about Maria?”

Iker grimaces. “Just for a few weeks now but she’s already tried to crawl into the oven twice that I’ve seen. Who knows what she gets up to with her grandmother during the day.” 

“It probably won’t hurt her, at least?” Sergio’s shoulders shake with contained laughter. 

“You’re laughing now but this will be you soon.” Iker is clearly aiming for stern and not quite hitting the mark; he’s smiling too much. 

Sergio tries to school his face. “I’m sure Tomás will be a perfect angel.” 

From there, somehow they get dragged into a discussion of the most horrifying things their children have put in their mouths, and the worst times they’ve had tantrums (Sergio wins that one with Tomás’s endless screaming fit that caused him to miss most of the final he was watching—the only thing that made him calm down was being in the stroller), and, improbably, the struggles of single parenting. 

No one else knocks at the door and despite his best intentions, Sergio ends up spending the rest of the hour learning more than he ever expected to about Iker’s ex-girlfriend and sharing more than he ought about his own misguided exploits—even if they got him Tomás in the end. 

“Oh, shit,” Iker mutters, cutting himself off in the middle of a thought about how the isolation of being at home with a kid has made him appreciate his work more. “If we don’t leave now, we’ll be late.”

“Oh, I’m—” Sergio trips over the words, and the whole thing comes out twisted and hesitant. “Sorry I kept—made you late?”

Iker’s smile is warm, and reassuring, and it makes Sergio’s stomach churn in that way that’s not quite unpleasant but isn’t quite fun either. “Don’t worry about it, it was great to chat. But we can’t have you late; I might have to dock you participation points.” 

Sergio turns on his best, most charming grin. “Could I do extra credit to make it up?”

Iker actually flushes, his cheeks tinted pink. “Do you really want to risk it?”

 

WEEK 9

Sergio takes his textbooks with him to the bar on Tuesday night; it won’t be crowded and Tomás is spending the night with his grandparents, after Sergio sneezed violently and repeatedly over all of them at dinner on Sunday. 

(“I’d rather take care of him now than both of you when you get him sick,” his mother had said, chiding but fond. And then she’d shooed him out the door with containers of soup and instructions to buy juice on the way home.)

He’s working through his reading for the week at an out-of-the-way table with a beer that he’s mostly ignoring when someone taps him on the shoulder. 

“Hi,” Iker says when Sergio turns around. “I hope I’m not interrupting.”

“Of course not,” Sergio says. “You’re more interesting than this anyway.”

Iker narrows his eyes. “Isn’t that the textbook for my class?”

“You’re still more interesting.” Sergio fixes Iker with a smile he knows is equal parts charm and innocence. Iker looks pleased as he slips into the seat across the table and, well, he hasn’t actually told Sergio to stop flirting yet. “You could just tell me what’s in the chapter, and I’d probably remember it better.”

That is not, strictly speaking, true, since he’ll probably end up thinking about better things Iker could do with his mouth, but a little white lie never hurt anyone.

“Learning to read effectively and critically is an important skill, Sergio,” Iker says, chiding but friendly. “I’ll buy you another beer when you finish, though.” 

The table wobbles ominously when Iker rests his bag on it, and then again when he removes a stack of papers and drops the bag unceremoniously on the floor. “I’m going to get a drink,” he says, and then, “Don’t spill anything on these or you’ll have a hundred angry first-years after you.” 

Sergio laughs aloud. 

Iker returns with his drink quickly enough, and Sergio busies himself with his reading while Iker mutters darkly and scratches at the papers with his red pen. He finishes quickly enough, and closes the book with snap, contemplating whether the table is too gross to rest his head on. Just to close his eyes. 

After a moment, Sergio concludes it isn’t, and lets his forehead drop to the table. The noise of the bar drifts around him, the noise of Iker’s grading the loudest but all of it comforting and repetitive. 

“Sergio, Sergio,” someone says. There’s a hand on his shoulder, gentle but firm. “Are you asleep?”

“No?” Sergio says, but his voice betrays him. “Maybe.” 

Iker’s looking at him like—like _something_ , a look Sergio’s never seen on him before. It feels important, the kindness in Iker’s eyes right now. 

“Maybe you need some rest more than you need another beer.” Iker’s voice is warm; Sergio wants to wrap himself up in it.

“No, no,” Sergio says. “I have more reading to do.”

Iker doesn’t answer, at least not with words. His pursed lips say a lot. 

“Not that much!” Sergio hedges immediately. “I’ll be done soon.”

“If you insist.” Iker shakes his head but returns to his seat on the other side of the table. “Don’t drool on your textbook, it’ll make it harder to resell.”

“Hey!”

Iker turns a smile that’s almost frighteningly innocent on Sergio. “There was something that looked like drool on your last essay. How do I know it wasn’t yours?”

“I have a one-year-old!” Sergio nearly shrieks. 

Iker just laughs at him. “Shut up and do your reading or you won’t get that beer.” 

In the end, Iker makes good on his promise, and they end the night drinking and laughing in horror at the most nonsensical things Iker’s first-years said in their essays. 

 

WEEK 10

Sergio is pretty sure he went to class, but between all the essays and Tomás deciding that sleep is a luxury rather than a necessity, he might just have hallucinated it. Or slept through it in the library. Or gone and immediately forgotten about it. 

Either way, after the second lecture of Iker’s class—he’s sure he went to this one—Iker beckons him aside as the rest of the students are leaving. 

“Is everything okay?” he says, pitched low enough that no is going to overhear them. 

Sergio shrugs, unwilling to lie but reluctant to tell the truth. “Just a busy week.”

“You look like shit,” Iker says. “It’s more than just a busy week, isn’t it?”

“Tomás hasn’t been sleeping well,” Sergio admits. “And I have a lot of essays to do. And I still have to find time to do contract work so I have a place to live.” He pauses, gauges the amount of pity on Iker’s face. “But that’s coffee is for. I’ll be fine.” 

Iker’s face is very serious, but not as pitying as Sergio feared. “I’m not having you fail this course because you weren’t getting any sleep,” he says, looking Sergio dead in the eye. “Is there someone who can take Tomás for a night or two?”

Sergio doesn’t answer immediately, and unfortunately Iker sees right through him. “Let me guess,” he says, “there is but you don’t want to ask.” Sergio nods, unable to meet Iker’s eyes. 

“My mother would, but she already does so much, and he’s my responsibility.” 

“I don’t want to be presumptuous,” Iker says, the words clearly measured. “But what if I took him for an evening? My mother is usually around, and Maria could use a playdate.” 

“Oh,” Sergio says. “Is that—are you allowed to do that?”

“Sure,” Iker says, calm and confident. “It’s not giving you an unfair advantage, since no one else in the class is about to fall asleep from trying to juggle a toddler and their coursework.”

Sergio shoves his hands in his pockets, takes them out again, fiddles with one of his belt loops. “If you’re sure you don’t mind—and it would be okay with your mother—and—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Iker says. His voice is so comforting. “Give me your phone number and your address and I’ll come pick Tomás up this afternoon. Maybe having a playdate will wear him out so he’ll sleep better.” 

The relief is so strong that Sergio actually feels a little lightheaded. “That would be amazing,” he says, trying to keep his voice even. “Thank you so much.” His hand shakes slightly as he scribbles his phone number and address on a piece of scratch paper. 

“Don’t worry about it,” Iker says. “I’ll see you later.”

Idly, Sergio thinks he could have kissed Iker from gratitude, but the thought sticks in his mind—he could have kissed Iker, he could kiss Iker, kissing Iker—endless permutations of what that might entail. Iker kissing him on the cheek when he shows up to pick up Tomás. Iker kissing his forehead reassuringly. Kissing Iker’s cheek in thanks. Kissing the corner of Iker’s mouth as a goodbye.

By the time he manages to focus on something else, he’s put so much thought into kissing Iker that it feels like it’s seared on the inside of his eyelids. 

\--

Iker texts him that afternoon, polite but succinct— _I’ll be there to pick Tomás up in about fifteen minutes_. Sergio frantically throws everything Tomás might need in a bag. Diapers, a bottle, his favorite blanket and stuffed dinosaur, some pajamas. Is he going to need to lend Iker the car seat? What about food? 

From his plastic baby entertainment center across the room, Tomás makes a demanding noise. It’s not quite “papa,” not yet, but it’s so close that Sergio’s heart aches a little bit. 

“Pa-ah,” Tomás says again, raising his arms up. He’s still holding the mallet from the little xylophone.

“Okay then, I can pick you up,” Sergio says, crossing the good. Tomás babbles, and shrieks delightedly when Sergio swings him in the air. Of course, as soon as he’s perched on Sergio’s hip so Sergio has at least one free hand to finish putting things together—a jacket in case it gets cold, he’ll need one of those—he drops the mallet.

And starts wailing. 

Sergio squats down, picks the mallet up, and hands it back to Tomás, whose tears immediately subside. He sticks the mallet in his mouth—and then, only a few seconds later, throws it back onto the floor and shrieks again. 

By the time Iker knocks on the door, Sergio’s thighs are burning. 

“Hi,” Iker says, smiling broadly. 

Sergio stares at him blankly for a moment. “Oh, um,” he says after an awkwardly long silence. “Hi. Come on in.”

Iker does, lurking just inside the doorway. Tomás eyes him warily from behind the coffee table. Sergio finishes shoving things into the diaper bag and drops it next to the sofa. It lands with a heavy thud and both Iker and Tomás flinch. 

Hefting Tomás into his arms, Sergio carries him over to Iker. “Hi, Tomás,” Iker says, his voice warm and low. “I’ve heard a lot about you.” It’s so perfectly formal that Sergio almost expects him to shake Tomás’s hand, but instead he taps Tomás softly on the nose and strokes his arm. 

Tomás coos. And then reaches out with a fist and sticks it in Iker’s mouth. Iker laughs, delicately removing the hand. 

“Do you need a car seat?” Sergio asks, breaking the moment between Iker and Tomás. 

“What?” Iker seems completely enthralled by Tomás. “Oh,” he says after a moment. “No, I have one in the car. Thanks.” His tone is distracted in a way Sergio’s never heard before, his fingers brushing through Tomás’s hair—long enough that it needs to be cut, and wispy in that perfectly baby-hair way. 

“Thanks again for doing this,” Sergio says. He sounds disgusting, excessively grateful and overcome. 

“Don’t worry about it.” Iker’s voice is so casual it’s kind of painful; the reminder that Sergio’s the only one in over his head here makes his stomach hurt even though it shouldn’t. Really, he should be glad that Iker being responsible means that this isn’t going to blow up spectacularly. It’s a good reminder that nothing good will come of pinning Iker to the door and kissing him. “What time do you want me to bring him home?” Iker asks, thankfully oblivious to Sergio’s inner monologue.

“Is ten too late?” 

Iker laughs. “No, I’ll be up later than that grading. See you at ten, then.” 

The first thing Sergio does when Iker closes the door with one hand, the bag over his shoulder and Tomás tucked steadily against his side, is to set a thirty minute timer on his phone and lie down on the couch. Everything else will be easier if he takes a nap first. 

\--

In hindsight, Sergio thinks as he closes his textbook, of course getting Tomás out of the house for the evening was a good idea. It’s not like everything’s done, but there’s a lot less of it than there was a few hours ago. And he actually has time to spare, which means he can lie down on the couch and put the TV on before he’s too tired to keep his eyes open.

It puts into very harsh context just how much time it takes to feed Tomás, and keep an eye on him, and put him to bed. He’s wonderful, Sergio thinks, but it’s just so much time. 

A knock at the door makes him jerk and almost fall off the couch. He squints at the glowing numbers on the cable box and—oh. That must be Iker. 

He knocks again.

“I’m coming,” Sergio yells, dragging himself upright. Iker is visible through the window in the door, something that must be a car seat handle in the crook of his elbow. When Sergio opens the door, he’s not surprised to see Tomás asleep in the unfamiliar car seat. 

“Hi,” Iker says, the corner of his mouth quirking up. “I hope you had a good evening.” 

Sergio rubs his eyes, and then wonders if he shouldn’t have. “I got a lot a done,” he says. 

“Good,” Iker says. He sounds so sincere. “Tomás was great,” he adds. “He and Maria played until he decided it was time to sleep and just sacked out on the floor.”

“Sounds like him,” Sergio says, smiling. 

“Can I—” Iker starts and—oh, right, they’re still standing in the doorway. Sergio moves to let Iker pass, and reaches for the car seat as he does. Iker hands it over smoothly, and luckily Tomás doesn’t wake up. He fusses briefly when Sergio unbuckles him but immediately goes back to sleep, his face tucked against Sergio’s neck.

“I can’t thank you enough,” Sergio says, low but more intense than he meant it to be. “I really needed to get this work done.” 

“Don’t worry about it.” Iker drops the bag, which he’s had slung over his shoulder all this time, on the floor. The image of him being casual with Sergio’s possessions expands behind his eyes—Iker sprawled on his sofa, Iker playing with Tomás, Iker cooking in his kitchen. “It was the least I could do,” Iker continues, jarring Sergio out of his thoughts. 

Tomás snuffles but doesn’t wake. Sergio realizes, belatedly, that he’s too worn out to make himself stop talking. “No,” he hears himself say. “No, it’s huge. Usually my mother takes him for a couple of nights a week but she’s out of town and everything just—everything totally piled up on me.”

Iker gives him a smile that looks almost fond, his eyes crinkling at the corners. “I’m glad I could help.” 

 

WEEK 13

Sergio spends three weeks in a haze of term papers and final exams, and it feels like the only people he interacts with are Tomás, his parents, and occasionally his classmates. He doesn’t speak to Iker at all—he barely leaves the house outside of class. René calls him at some point and Sergio’s so strung out he snaps a lot, and completely fails at making conversation. 

He emerges, exhausted and with a small cold, to discover that he did, in fact, pass all his classes. His mother snatches Tomás away from him, scolding him that he’ll get his son sick. Sergio’s too tired to argue, even though she’s probably being paranoid and he knows how to take care of a child without getting him sick, _mama_. 

For all the talk, as soon as Tomás is gone, Sergio falls asleep on the sofa and doesn’t wake up for three hours. He wakes up, groggy and disoriented, with his face smashed into a throw pillow that isn’t particularly soft and his shirt bunched up to his armpits. When the immediate, overwhelming spike of worry about Tomás passes, he drags himself upright and into the kitchen. 

He might have soup? Sergio squints at the cabinets, and opens a few of them. There’s not a lot left, after spending a week eating everything in the house and not taking the time to buy food. Leftover pizza probably won’t make him any sicker. What his mother doesn’t know won’t hurt her. 

\--

Sergio sleeps straight through for eleven hours and wakes up feeling like a human again. His head is clear and he can breathe and he’s only coughing a little bit. His mother refuses to return Tomás to his care until the coughing is completely gone, so he drifts through the day without any schedule to stick to. It’s disorienting, not having him around to take care of and distract him. He does some of his contract work, goes out to buy some food so they won’t starve, even sits around watching some kids in the park practicing keepy-uppies. 

Eventually, he’s so useless and listless that he goes to the bar just so that he won’t creep anyone out staring at kids. There’s some toddlers playing in a patch of grass, tearing it up and sprinkling it on each other, with their parents laughing as they watch. The kids are a year or two older than Tomás, probably, but it twists in his heart anyway.

If someone had told him, three years ago, how little it would take for him to miss his son, he’d have laughed.

At least, at the bar, there’s people and conversation and matches on the scattered TVs. A few of them are playing the news, the streaming ticker at the bottom running through stories that Sergio’s missed entirely in his daze of finals. 

“Hello,” someone says from behind him, in a voice that’s already too familiar. 

Sergio takes a steadying breath before he turns around, the movement carefully paced so as not to seem too enthusiastic. “Hi, Iker.” The words tug a smile onto his face, and then Iker is smiling back and climbing onto the vacant stool next to him. 

“How are you?”

It takes Sergio a moment to respond, transfixed by Iker’s smile—the soft wrinkles at the corners of his eyes. The awkward tuft of hair over his forehead, that’s never quite the same but that he can’t seem to tame either. “Oh,” he says, a hair too late. “It was fine. I survived my finals.”

“Congratulations,” Iker says, somewhere between sincere and teasing. “How’s Tomás? Has he missed me?”

“It’s all he’s talked about,” Sergio says, the corner of his mouth twisting up. He can’t stop the grin. 

“Good,” Iker says. 

“How was your week?” Sergio asks, because he’s not completely hopeless at social niceties. 

Iker grimaces. “I graded a lot of finals.” 

“Tell me the highlights,” Sergio says, smirking. Iker gives him a scathing look but launches into a surprisingly animated description of one final where the student didn’t understand a few of the key themes and ended up handing in a complex diatribte on completely the wrong subject. Sergio laughs, and Iker keeps talking, and it’s kind of—well, it’s perfect. Iker pauses briefly to order some food from the bartender, and then immediately falls back into stories of catastrophic, hilarious misspellings.

“Wait,” Sergio says, interrupting him. “Are you sure that one wasn’t me?”

Iker furrows his brow. “Well, no.”

Sergio bursts out laughing and nearly spills his beer in the process. 

The bartender sets a plate of food down in front of Iker, and Sergio immediately reaches for the chips. Iker, with impeccable reflexes, swats his hand away. “Get your own.” Sergio sticks his lower lip out in an exaggerated pout, and Iker rolls his eyes. 

“You’re ridiculous,” he says, but it feels so fond that Sergio nearly shivers. 

“How’s Maria?” Sergio asks, to have something else to pay attention to. Iker’s whole face lights up and he’s so focused on his answer that it’s easy to steal a chip. And a second. It’s not until the fourth that Iker realizes what’s going on and scowls at Sergio.

“You sneak,” he says. “You owe me.”

Sergio puts on his most affected innocent face and Iker just stares at him, completely deadpan, for at least thirty seconds before he cracks a smile. Something twists in the pit of Sergio’s stomach, the way it does every time he makes Iker smile. It feels like he’s won a prize even though there wasn’t ever a competition. 

They fall into a companionable silence, the dated and slightly-too-loud music from the speakers washing over them, familiar but somehow still intrusive. Sergio hums absently, mouths the words to the chorus, and ignores the weight of Iker’s eyes on him. 

“Do you need to go?” Iker asks, and Sergio would think it was a hint except that his smile looks forced and there’s something that feels like regret in his voice. “It’s getting late.”

“My mama took Tomás, she thought I was getting sick and didn’t want him to catch anything,” Sergio says, pitching his voice at something he hopes is casual. “What about Maria?”

There’s something Sergio can’t recognize, an emotion he’s never seen on Iker before, when he says, “His mother’s in town and she’s taken her for a night.” It’s not resentment, or—it sounds almost hopeful?

It’s not that Sergio doesn’t want to know about Iker’s life, about his relationship with Maria’s mother, it’s that he doesn’t want to know right now, when it’s late and it feels like something inevitable is building between them. Instead, he comments on the song playing—popular fifteen years ago, and obnoxiously upbeat and catchy. He sings a few bars at Iker, who laughs and covers his ears. 

“You just don’t recognize talent when you hear it,” Sergio says loftily, and Iker rolls his eyes.

\--

They’re not young, though, and it’s not even midnight when Sergio feels his energy flagging. “I think I’m still tired from exams,” he says apologetically. 

Iker follows him out with a shrug and nod. And then they’re standing outside the bar, the night air just barely chilly, and Sergio is shifting his weight from foot to foot, unsure what he wants to say.

“Well, I’ll see you around, probably,” Iker says, with the uncomfortable inflection of someone who isn’t sure whether or not he means it.

“Good night,” Sergio says. That’s not what he wanted to say, but he isn’t actually sure how to put what he does want into words anyway. 

He expects Iker to turn, to start walking in the other direction, but he doesn’t. Iker gestures vaguely and opens his mouth, probably about to explain that he lives this way too or something. 

_Fuck it_ , Sergio thinks, the words crystal clear in his mind, and he turns to face Iker. Iker is already looking at him, and the moment is so charged it almost makes Sergio shiver.

“I’m going to kiss you,” Sergio says. 

Iker’s mouth forms a silent “oh,” but he doesn’t object. There’s an alley between the bar and the next building, and Sergio guides him toward it with a hand on his back. It’s darker than the sidewalk, but they’re at least a little shielded from view here.

Sergio takes two steps, until he’s standing closer to Iker than he ever has before. Iker’s head is tilted up slightly to look at him, and then Sergio just—kisses him. It’s easier to do than it is to think about. 

At first, they’re not touching anywhere else, just Iker’s lips cool from the beer and the breeze, and slightly chapped against Sergio’s. Then Iker is lacing their fingers together, squeezing, and Sergio steps forward to back Iker against the wall of the bar. He winds his free hand around the back of Iker’s neck. 

“Oh,” Iker breathes out. His mouth is open against Sergio’s now, and Sergio tugs on his lower lip. God, he’s thought about that lip a lot. He’s distracted by the taste of Iker’s mouth, beer and salt and skin, and barely notices Iker’s arm around his back until he’s being pulled closer. 

Iker pulls away and, before Sergio has time to chase his mouth, kisses across his jaw. The noise Sergio makes is entirely involuntary and utterly embarrassing. Iker hums against his skin. 

“I’ve thought about this a lot.” The words are breathed against Sergio’s ear, and they send heat curling through his stomach. 

“Jesus, Iker,” he says. And then, “I have too.” Honesty is the best policy, right?

“Good,” Iker says. His voice is rougher than Sergio’s ever heard it, even after an hour of non-stop lecturing. 

It’s—god. The one thing Sergio hasn’t let himself think about through all of this is how _hot_ Iker is. He’s smart and funny and charming and endearingly shy in bursts and wonderful with children, but Sergio’s drawn that line at thinking about what he would look like pushed up against a wall and kissed within an inch of his life.

Maybe if he’s thought about it, he’d have been more prepared for the reality of it, but he’s not convinced. 

Either way, Iker is looking at him with open want, and Sergio feels like he can’t breathe, like he’s drowning in Iker’s undisguised desire. Iker’s free hand is resting low on Sergio’s back, warm and firm and sure. 

There’s a lot of things Sergio could do right now. He chooses leaning in and kissing Iker again, learning the shape of his mouth, the way he reacts when Sergio nips at his lip, licks behind his teeth, trails sloppy kisses down the line of his jaw, sucks on the soft skin under his ear.

Iker is quiet, mostly, which isn’t a surprise. But he’s easy to read nonetheless—the way his body tenses and relaxes, the way his arm tightens across Sergio’s back when something is particularly good. He’s breathing heavy, and, when Sergio pulls back enough to see his face, he’s flushed and his lips are red. 

“We should—go,” Iker says, the words gasped between heavy breaths.

He’s right, of course—when isn’t he right?—but there’s something appealing to Sergio about the idea of debauching Iker against a wall, where anyone could walk by and see. It feels like being back in school and sneaking around, like bad decisions and recklessness and the thrill of breaking the rules for the first time. 

“Do we have to?” Sergio says, trying to sound seductive. Iker gives him a look that’s shockingly stony for how clearly aroused he is.

“Yes,” he says. “I’m not getting arrested outside a bar for public indecency.”

Sergio waggles his eyebrows obnoxiously. “So you’re planning to be indecent then?”

Iker laughs and pushes him away. “Not here I’m not.” 

\--

The walk to Sergio’s house—very slightly closer, apparently—is tense and hurried. He doesn’t trust himself to touch Iker, not now that thoughts of Iker being _indecent_ are swirling through his mind. Iker on his knees. Sergio on his knees, Iker’s hand tugging on his hair. Iker naked in his bed.

Sergio fumbles the keys three times before he unlocks the door, but Iker doesn’t laugh. He’s basically a saint. And then they’re inside and, somehow, no one is pressing anyone else into a wall. Instead, they’re staring at each other, not even touching. 

They’re probably rushing this, Sergio thinks, and Iker still looks out of place in his living room. It’s too important to rush, but Sergio’s not sure how to slow things down now. He’s not sure he wants to. Iker is so important, he matters too much to ruin this but he matters too much to be left untouched. 

“Are you sure?” Iker asks, quiet and perfect. “I don’t—this isn’t just tonight.” He looks almost nervous, like he’s afraid Sergio isn’t in this too deep, isn’t too invested and isn’t going to get his heart broken. 

Sergio nods, not trusting his voice, and then Iker kisses him. It’s different from the kisses outside, there’s something behind it that wasn’t there before. Rich and deep and strong, overwhelming and surrounding. 

The kiss lingers, drags itself on into trails of kisses down necks and roaming hands, but the image of Iker naked and sprawled across Sergio’s bed lingers behind his eyes. His pale skin flushed against the sheets, his hideous sweatpants tossed carelessly on the floor. 

“Not here,” Sergio whispers into the curve of Iker’s shoulder when Iker starts tugging at the bottom of Sergio’s shirt. “I want to be able to look at you.” 

Iker exhales sharply. 

Sergio turns and heads for his bedroom. There’s a sharp fear in his stomach that Iker won’t follow, but he hears padding footsteps behind himself immediately, and then Iker is lingering in the doorway of his bedroom. There are clothes all over the floor, and a pile of Tomás’s plushies on the chair in the corner. One is lying on the bed, a little dinosaur with multicolored spines down its back. It jingles when it moves, Sergio knows.

He throws it across the room and the jingling echoes in the silence. Iker laughs, then, and it’s one of the best sounds Sergio’s ever heard. It snaps the tension and everything settles into something easier. 

Sergio tugs his shirt over his head and Iker takes a few steps forward, until he’s close enough to twine his fingers with Sergio’s and kiss him again. Soft, this time, like Sergio is something precious that needs to be taken care of. He isn’t, but it makes his heart hurt to be kissed this way. 

Eventually, Iker’s hands roam up his chest, cool from the night, and Sergio realizes that Iker is still wearing all his clothes. His hands are shaking just the tiniest bit as he pushes at Iker’s baggy t-shirt and tugs on the drawstring of his sweatpants. There’s a tinge of sheepishness to Iker’s smile as the pulls the shirt over his head.

“It’s been a while,” he says, biting his lip. Sergio tries not to smirk, fails miserably, and winds his arms around Iker’s neck to make up for it.

“Yeah?” he says, pulling Iker closer. “I’m flattered.” He ducks in and kisses Iker quickly, pulling away immediately. Iker makes a tiny noise of frustration. Sergio does it again, laughing as he does, but Iker’s wise to it and follows his mouth. 

Sergio’s laughter dies against Iker’s lips but he can’t make himself stop smiling. Iker is smiling too, Sergio can feel it though the kiss, and it’s—it’s perfect. Iker opens his mouth, kisses him harder and slides a hand around the back of his neck. His hands are warm now, and he tugs gently where Sergio’s hair is getting a little too long. The noise Sergio makes is patently embarrassing, but it’s muffled by Iker’s mouth, and Iker just kisses him harder. 

When they break apart, Sergio is gasping a little bit and Iker is flushed all the way down to his chest. It’s heady, thinking that he’s responsible for this, for Iker’s red skin and intense eyes and the way his sweatpants are threatening to slip off his hips. 

Sergio takes a moment to drink it in, and then undoes the drawstring and pushes Iker’s pants the rest of the way down. They crumple to the floor and—god. There’s so much skin that Sergio had to remind himself to breathe. So much wonderful skin, and Iker’s small smile and he just wants to _look_. Iker doesn’t move, lets Sergio’s eyes drift over him. 

“You look so good,” Sergio says. It would probably be more seductive if he didn’t sound so overwhelmed, but this is everything he hasn’t been letting himself imagine and it’s happening and he can reach out and touch as much as he wants.

And then Iker is pressing into his space, backing him toward the bed and fumbling with the button of his pants. “Come on,” he mutters, the words warm and breathy against Sergio’s skin. “Hurry up.” 

Sergio hums, kicking his pants off. “Okay,” he says. “If you insist.” He can’t see Iker’s face where it’s buried in his neck, but he almost feel him rolling his eyes. He stumbles back when Iker pushes him softly and the backs of his knees hit the bed, bracing himself on his elbows and looking up at Iker with a grin that’s somewhere between sultry and smug. 

The tables are turned then, and Sergio can tell that Iker is just enjoying getting watch for a moment. There’s a certain appeal to being watched, to the way Iker’s eyes trace slowly up his legs and across his chest, lingering on the tattoo nestled between his hips. But at the same time, it would be nice to be _touched_ and he makes an impatient noise. Iker shakes his head, laughing softly. “Impatient,” he says, tutting softly.

“Are you surprised?” Sergio asks.

“Well, no.” 

Iker gives him a considering look, but he evidently decides to be nice, because he settles himself on his knees over Sergio’s lap and kisses him again. 

Without the use of his hands, it’s a different experience entirely—nothing to focus on but the movement of his lips against Iker’s. Iker’s grip on his shoulders is firm, bordering on painful; he’s probably holding on for balance, pitched forward over Sergio, but it’s a sharp, grounding sensation either way. His mouth is gentle and open and carefully searching against Sergio’s, like he’s trying to learn the shape of him. 

Sergio closes his eyes and lets it happen, lets himself be kissed until he feels like he can’t hold himself up off the bed any longer, until his joints feel weak and he’s shaking with the need to reach up and touch Iker. He squirms until his arms are free enough to move and falls back into the blankets. Iker overbalances and tumbles on top of him, his weight perfectly anchoring. 

He gasps, the sound sharp against Sergio’s mouth, but Sergio swallows it, kisses him soundly until Iker is clutching at his shoulders again and tugging his hair. 

Their hips are nestled together but it’s not right, the friction is off and there’s not enough skin. Sergio pushes at Iker’s briefs until his hands are on the bare skin of Iker’s perfect ass. 

The sound Iker makes when Sergio gets a hand around him is—it’s—he could die and never hear anything but that sound again and it would be heaven. Iker’s hips jerk forward so hard that Sergio nearly loses his grip, and it makes them both laugh. 

“Sorry,” Iker gasps, which might be the most ridiculous thing anyone has ever said to Sergio in bed. He ignores it, choosing to focus on adjusting his grip instead. Watching Iker’s face to see what he likes best, what makes his eyes close and his mouth fall open. Slow, steady motions of his hand. A gentle twist at the top. 

After what’s maybe a few minutes, Iker shakes his head and buries his face in Sergio’s neck, kissing messily at the skin above his collarbone. He’s muttering something, the words indecipherable but his breath hot. 

“Don’t stop,” Sergio makes out when Iker lifts his head briefly. He twists to kiss the top of Iker’s head but keeps his hand moving. It’s only a short time later that Iker gasps and shakes, splattering come across Sergio’s hand and chest. He collapses, his face still tucked against Sergio’s neck. 

For a few moments, Sergio lets him rest there, limp and breathing heavy. His weight is comforting, anchoring, at once overwhelming and the thing that keeps everything else from being overwhelming. Iker’s breath against his neck is hot and they’re sticking together, damp skin pressed to damp skin. Iker squirms just the smallest bit, though, settling himself, and it reminds Sergio of just how absurdly hard he is. 

It doesn’t take him long, rolling his hips up against Iker’s, to come. He closes his eyes afterward. Iker still hasn’t moved. 

“You’re disgusting,” Iker mutters eventually, sticky-hot and slow. 

Sergio hums, not willing to exert the effort to open his mouth. It sounds kind of like “whatever,” which is what he would have said if he weren’t too lazy. Slowly, Iker pries himself off and flops onto the bed. He tucks his face back into Sergio’s shoulder, though. Even with come drying on his stomach, Sergio can’t bring himself to break the moment by moving. 

“I’ll shower in the morning,” he says. His voice is rough. 

Iker wrinkles his nose—Sergio can feel the way his face scrunches up—but doesn’t actually stand up to clean himself off so he’s just as gross. Sergio tells him as much and Iker shoves him halfheartedly. But he presses a soft kiss to Sergio’s shoulder immediately afterward. 

 

WEEK SOMETHING-OR-OTHER

Sergio wakes up with Iker’s arm in a vise-like grip around his waist and the very ominous noise of something falling in the living room. He tries to extract himself from the bed without waking Iker up, which predictably fails, and he finds himself tugged back toward the mattress.

“I need to get up,” he says. Iker makes a noise of displeasure. “No, really,” Sergio insists. “Tomás is doing something.”

Iker grumbles but releases him. In the living room, something breaks loudly. Sergio groans. 

He kisses Iker, hard and deep, before he scrubs his hands across his face and ventures into the living room.


End file.
